Yesterday was a pivotal moment for Lotus – the sports car maker announced that it had regained the use of its own brand in China after a long-running legal battle with the defunct Youngman. The brand had previously been forced to use the brand Lotus Nyo ever since it started selling cars in the Middle Kingdom in 2011.
The confusion started as a faux pas back when it was still owned by Proton, giving away its brand name for the national carmaker’s joint venture with Youngman – you may remember that at some point, Youngman switched from Europestar to Lotus branding for its Gen.2-based models.
Even though Youngman reportedly ended passenger car production in 2015 (and the firm itself has since gone bankrupt), the company continued to hold on to the Lotus brand rights in China. This led to a struggle to wrest back control of the marque that lasted over five years, according to an internal memo sighted by Chinese portal IT Home.
The legal battle finally ended on December 7, giving Lotus not only the right to ditch the “Nyo” part of its brand but also the right to use the Chinese word for the lotus flower (莲花, or liánhuā), rather than the phonetic transliteration of “Lotus” (路特斯, or lùtèsī).
“The reason why we insisted on taking back “Lotus” is because it is our most important asset that enables us to cross cycles, overcome difficulties, and be remembered and paid tribute to by the industry, users and car fans,” said CEO Feng Qingfeng in a press release. “It is the compass in our hearts and Lotus Engineering and Lotus Team are our most precious brand totems.”
In the same internal memo, Feng also said that for the first time in its 77-year history, the company managed to deliver over 2,000 vehicles globally last month, letting it enter the new year on a high.
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